How Weaving Shaped the Architecture of Ombak KLCC

Beyond its fluid exterior, Ombak KLCC reveals an architectural language expressed through interlocking volumes, a responsive facade and spaces that connect with the wider KLCC precinct.

Words: Aqilah Najwa Jamaluddin

Ombak is the Malay word for wave, and one look at the building makes it easy to see why.

Long bands sweep around its exterior, curving and overlapping against the vertical skyline of Kuala Lumpur City Centre. But if you follow those bands as they wrap around the building, another idea starts to reveal itself. They cross, overlap and appear to pull through one another, much like strands in a weave.

And that is precisely where the architecture of Ombak KLCC begins: with the idea of weaving.

Designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox, Ombak KLCC was previously known as the KLCC Lot M Podium. By 2022, KPF Principal Mustafa Chehabeddine was already presenting its envelope design as “The Woven Landmark”, revealing an architectural concept that preceded the name we know today.

It Begins With The Weave

Rather than applying a traditional pattern to the exterior, KPF interpreted weaving through the way individual elements cross, overlap and connect.

Two volumes appear to tuck beneath and pull through one another, much like interlacing strands. From there, the movement continues across the exterior as flowing bands wrap around the podium.

The result is a subtle translation of craft into architecture, expressed through the building’s composition rather than applied as ornament.

Yet those bands are shaped by more than appearance.

Where Form Meets Function

According to KPF, their widths vary in response to the daylight requirements of the spaces behind them. Solid surfaces expand and contract while maintaining the impression of one continuous form.

What appears sculptural from the outside therefore has a practical relationship with the interior. The same architectural language continues into one of the building’s most prominent features.

Making Room For Art And The City

GALERI PETRONAS occupies a cantilevered volume that projects from the building, giving the gallery a visible architectural presence within the KLCC precinct.

Below, the cantilever helps frame a sheltered public plaza.

Here, the weaving concept reaches beyond the building envelope. The interwoven form connects key arrival points and public spaces at ground level before continuing upwards towards a landscaped roof garden.

Rather than treating the gallery as another destination within a commercial development, its position makes culture part of Ombak KLCC’s architectural identity.

Looking Back Towards KLCC

At roof level, a landscaped garden provides views towards the PETRONAS Twin Towers, bringing Ombak KLCC into direct visual conversation with the landmark that has defined the precinct for decades.

The contrast between them is striking. Where the Twin Towers rise vertically, Ombak KLCC spreads horizontally. Its identity comes from layers, curves and overlapping surfaces rather than height.

Perhaps that is the clearest way to understand its architecture. What begins as a principle borrowed from weaving gradually shapes how the building looks, functions and meets the city.

Ultimately, its name may evoke the wave, but it is the weave that gives Ombak KLCC its architectural language.